Casio develops sauna watch with 12-minute timer, unveils three colors in Japan

Most of us, for all sane reasons, would prefer not to wear a watch to a sauna. Saunas have an unfriendly environment for watches that can experience failure due to expansion from heat and moisture. Casio, however, believes sauna goers would have a better track of the time to spend inside if they had a watch on the wrist; supposedly why sauna-going creators within Casio have developed heat and moisture-resistant watch that you can wear in a sauna.

This special watch – Casio CPP-002 – is intended for use in hot and humid environments, such as in a sauna. It features a body made from resin, said to have low moisture absorptivity, and comes paired with a coiled, expandable wristband that draws design reference from wristbands used with locker keys at gyms and saunas. The watch with the band weighs only 24.5 grams.

Designer: Casio

The idea of a heat and humidity-resistant watch from Casio is welcome news for many G-Shock takers – including firefighters – who would want this tech to trickle down to their favorite Casio watch lineup. We don’t have a word on whether that is happening anytime soon, but what we know is that Casio is going to launch the watch through a crowdfunding campaign on the Makuake platform in Japan.

Maybe a successful campaign allows the experimental tech to reach through to a heat-resistant and moisture-resistant G-Shock. For now, this 35.4 mm sauna watch wears an analog dial and comes with a 12-minute counter to time sauna sessions. The timer will let you know “sauna, cold bath, and break times at a glance,” the campaign page (expected to go live on December 2) reads.

The Casio CPP-002 arrives in three color variants: Orange, Black and Blue. Blue watch, model no CPP-002-BU, has been designed in collaboration with Sauna Ikitai: A sauna search website. The water resistance rating is 5 ATM (50 meters) and features two pusher buttons to switch modes and reset. It is likely to cost in the ¥10,000 – ¥11,000 ($60 to $70) range, but sadly will only ship to addresses in Japan. There is no mention of global availability at the time of writing: more clarity is expected once the crowdfunding campaign gets underway.